The black swan is probably the most widely misunderstood philosophical term of this century. I tend to find it being thrown around to refer to anything surprising and negative. But that’s not how Taleb defined it.
Taleb defined it very simply as any high impact surprise event. Of course, the definition of surprise is relative to the observer. To the lunatics at the NYT who push bilge about continuing American primacy, a meteoric decline in America’s standing (probably emerging from some of the fragilities I have identified in the global economic fabric) would be a black swan. It would also be a black swan to the sorry swathes of individuals who believe what they hear in the mainstream media, and from the lips of politicians (both Romney and Obama have recently paid lip service to the idea that America is far from decline). Such an event would not really be a black swan to me; I believe America and her allies will at best be a solid second in the global pecking order — behind the ASEAN group — by 2025, simply because ASEAN make a giant swathe of what we consume (and not vice verse), and producers have a historical tendency to assert authority over consumers.
But black swans are not just events. They can also be non-events. To Harold Camping and his messianic followers who confidently predicted the apocalypse on the 21st of May 2011 (and every other true-believing false prophet) the non-event was a black swan. Surprising (to them at least) and high impact, because it surely changed the entire trajectory of their lives. (Camping still lives on Earth, rather than in Heaven as he supposedly expected).
To true-believing environmentalists who warn of Malthusian catastrophe (i.e. crises triggered by overpopulation or resource depletion), history is studded with these black swan non-events.
From the Economist:
Forecasters of scarcity and doom are not only invariably wrong, they think that being wrong proves them right.
In 1798 Thomas Robert Malthus inaugurated a grand tradition of environmentalism with his best-selling pamphlet on population. Malthus argued with impeccable logic but distinctly peccable premises that since population tended to increase geometrically (1,2,4,8 ) and food supply to increase arithmetically (1,2,3,4 ), the starvation of Great Britain was inevitable and imminent. Almost everybody thought he was right. He was wrong.
In 1865 an influential book by Stanley Jevons argued with equally good logic and equally flawed premises that Britain would run out of coal in a few short years’ time. In 1914, the United States Bureau of Mines predicted that American oil reserves would last ten years. In 1939 and again in 1951, the Department of the Interior said American oil would last 13 years. Wrong, wrong, wrong and wrong.
Predictions of ecological doom, including recent ones, have such a terrible track record that people should take them with pinches of salt instead of lapping them up with relish. For reasons of their own, pressure groups, journalists and fame-seekers will no doubt continue to peddle ecological catastrophes at an undiminishing speed. These people, oddly, appear to think that having been invariably wrong in the past makes them more likely to be right in the future. The rest of us might do better to recall, when warned of the next doomsday, what ever became of the last one.
Critics will note that Malthusians only have to be right once to provoke dire consequences; deaths, famines, plagues. Of course, that is the same logic that has led governments to spend trillions, and trample the constitutional rights of millions of people in fighting amateurish jihadis, when in reality more Americans — yes including the deaths from 9/11 — are crushed to death by furniture than are killed by Islamic terrorism.
But it is true, the scope of the threat posed by Malthusian catastrophe is probably an order of magnitude greater than by jihadis with beards in caves. And of course, groups like the Club of Rome and individuals like Paul Ehrlich will keep spewing out projections of imminent catastrophe.
So what were the real threats to humanity following Malthus’ predictions? Was it overpopulation? Nope. Imperial warfare killed far, far more than any famine or resource crisis in the 20th Century. To the overwhelming majority of the population, World War I — both in its origins (the assassination of an obscure archduke), its scope, its death toll, and its final ramifications (i.e. the Treaty of Versailles, the rise of Nazim and World War II) was the great black swan event, the great killer, the great menace.
Black swan events defined the 20th Century; the black swan non-events of Malthus did not. The true story of the early 20th Century was the decline of a heavily indebted, consumptive and overstretched imperial power (Britain), and the dangers to peace and international commerce as its productive and expansionistic rivals (especially Germany, but also America) rose and challenged her (in vastly different ways).
There are some real environmental concerns like the dangers posed by nuclear meltdowns, runaway global warming (although I believe a little global warming is probably a good thing, as it will keep us out of any prospective future ice age), tectonic activity, or an exotic solar event like an X-flare, but we have no clue what will hit us, when it will hit, and its branching tree of consequences. We don’t have a full view of the risks. In spite of what unsophisticated mathematician pseudo-scientists in the tradition of Galton and Quetelet may tell us, we cannot even model reality to the extent of being able to accurately foretell tomorrow’s weather.
But once again a heavily consumptive, indebted and overstretched imperial power (America) is coming to terms with the problem of decreasing power in the face of productive and expansionistic rivals (particularly China). That parallel tends to lead me to believe that imperialist warfare will be the greatest menace of the 21st Century, too. But that’s the problem with predicting the future: we simply don’t know what black swan events and non-events nature will deliver (although it would be wise not too place too much trust in politicians or the establishment media, who simply blow their own trumpet and hope for the best).
So what are we to do?
Well, I think it’s important that businesses, governments and individuals think about Malthusian concerns. Malthus’ incorrect theorising touched upon the most significant of human concerns. Quite simply, without food, water and energy we weak and fragile humans are imperilled. It’s important that governments (particularly of importer nations) devise strategies to cope with (for example) breakdowns in the international trade system. Individuals, families, businesses and communities should be aware of where their food, energy and water come from, and of alternatives in case the line of supply is cut. Keeping backups (e.g. solar panels, batteries, wind turbines, storable food and water) is a sensible precaution for all citizens. There will be shocks in the future, just as there have been in the past. We should be prepared for shocks, whatever they may be.
And we should learn to love such volatility. Nature will always deliver it. We evolved and developed with it. It is only in modernity that we have adopted systems procedures and methodologies to subdue volatility. And — as we are slowly learning via the disastrous consequences of every single failed experiment in central planning — volatility suppressed is like a coiled spring.


![[Éú̬]£¨1£©ºÚÌì¶ì·ÉÁÙÒúÍÔ°](http://azizonomics.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/001109b42f730931dd102f.jpg?w=600)
I like that Theory Tyler! It's that "Red Herring" that kills you every time
The Black Swans are living in the White House!
I'm beginning to think that the next black swan may be a politician or policymaker who actually does the right thing, in which case the Fed will tank the market to make sure it NEVER, EVER happens again.
This is fucking genius.
Massive Attack - hymn of the big wheel
http://youtu.be/M8JcM_FPfRo
So then.. Let me see if I have this right: A "Black Swan" can even be an event that has already happened or is still happening but TPTB the MSM and the Sheeple have just realized it or accepted it as a fact because of limitation of the realm of their conciousness?
Can they then prevent it by going to a forrest?
In divinity you call that delayed epiphany which is celebrated On January 6th. Maybe that is the day! fourteen days before Obummer or Romney get to play god.
Divine Quote.<>.
I just don't get this Malthus. We keep killing him, and he keeps getting back up! Somebody take a head shot, quick!
Perhaps if Malthus had ordered 450,000,000 rounds of 40 cal hollow-points people would take him seriously.
I was thinking ( darts & poison/frogs) ? South American style?
Great G.P. SE, good stuff right here!
The type of politico's mentioned are emerging in local communities as we speak. I live and work in a municipality currently governed by one such specimen. Of course achieving this locally is much easier than nationally but it is a start. I am witnessing 'green shoots' first hand if you will. Growing that to the point of being able to secure the $$ and clout required for the big ball of wax in DC is the real challenge ahead of us. Until then, just keep voting the bums out. Consistent turnover in DC is the starting point.
uhhhh, right.
Researchers Hack Voting Machine for $26No reason to hack when you can just walk right in.
Hi...I'm Eric Holder and I'm here to vote.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5p70YbRiPw&feature=player_embedded
When I lived in Whitehorse (pop. 26,000), Yukon, in '86 we had a territorial goverment like that. They went around to all the small(er) towns and asked people for their ideas instead of the other way around. People who had squatted on Crown land in the bush were given a route to get legal title to their homes. They cut wasteful spending, expanded the woods buffalo herd and hunting access. They cut deals with Alaska, BC, the Canadian and US gov'ts to get a big mine reopened that hauled ore across borders to the salt chuck at Skagway. They were a lot like Sarah Palin in Alaska 20 years later. They were fresh, hard working, shook things up and got the economy moving. In those days you could walk right into the legislature, no guards, no metal detectors. They were the leftist party (NDP) but they were more free enterprise than the bloody Tories who were big goverment like the Liberals.
Dude, you know why the NDP were hated by the Liberals and the PC. Like Palin in Alaska, they didn't take money from the oils or the banksters. The people who drove Palin from power in Alaska are the same people who pimped Brian Mulroney and Jean Chretien; whores of the Ruling Class who called themselves leftists. They just happen to be Americans who hoovered Obama's johnson 24/7 and called it "change". I think the NDP changed over time and got too institutional and trendy left and became more like the Liberals in power, however, which is why they declined in power.
Now Palin's party, as opposed to Palin herself, is about to inflict Mitt Romney on the American people. If there was a certified economic war criminal right out of the Gordon Gekko School of Banksterism, it's Mitt. To the Establishment GOP, a Rising Tide lifts all Yachts.
Not that it matters; Mitt and Obama are trained poodles for TPTB anyway. Just thought I'd remind all the Paultards on this board who think that Paul would ever be allowed near the White House on anything other than a Tour Bus. Palin too, for that matter, I suspect.
We are only Paultards if we truly believe that he has a chance of being elected. This is as opposed to being a full retard who votes for either Mitt or Barry.
They might let him get elected in order to blame everything on him. That would be too complicated and risky I think though.
"Just thought I'd remind all the Paultards on this board who think that Paul would ever be allowed near the White House on anything other than a Tour Bus."
You're right that he won't get the nod. Our votes are probably worthless anyway. However, I won't vote for Obama or Mitt. Thanks to those who reminded me about the write in!
"I'm beginning to think that the next black swan may be a politician or policymaker who actually does the right thing"
What the hell makes you think that from those vile bastards?
Who is Ron Paul?
or for that matter Dennis Kucinich? Both will need to get a real job soon enough.
FWIW
Paul drew about 7K-10K at UCLA and Berkeley last week. (He filled the tennis court at UCLA - See Youtube) TPTB should be scared shitless atm. There is no doubt the revolution is here. Watching the awakening happen exponentially is awesome.
I hope he continues these crusades full time after this election sham is over. Once he can bring other people on stage with him, the movement will no longer be about him but about his ideas. Let support him so that he can fill baseball stadiums in the future.
.
Could Ron Paul be the Black Swan nobody thought possible?
You've forgotten how the system works. It's a "system", and even if Ron Paul managed to get the Diebolds to vote for him, what could he accomplish by himself?
Do you see a majority of Republicans co-operating with him to unwind the Giant Embezzle? Well then, how about a majority of Democrats? No?
Could you even get a majority of American voters to give up the Free Lunches Forever? Think Monsanto, GE and United Technologies would give up their perqs and subsidies?
I understand and share your frustration, apathy, and views on what likely lack of results we could expect after an unlikely win by Ron Paul.
However, you have to play the cards your dealt.
Vote your conscience. Do what you think is right. What others may do is immaterial.
except for those guys in my post above.
Yes, you have to play the cards you're dealt by the house or fold. No doubt the last hand was pretty shitty.
Dealer!...I demand a fresh deck!
Dealer ... I demand a new dealer!
I agree. Some might think that Ron Paul is the black swan, but I think that it is more likely that TPTB already have their gold positions and are ready for that Black Swan Event.
Fortunately, I am going to be Black Swanned away when Jesus returns. Good luck to you other half left.
ron paul is a black swan to the elite, but i don't think ron paul being president is a black swan.
anyway, he's too good for that disgusting horse race.
Jesus H Fucking Christ.
Ron Paul is an already knwon commodity.
And as such ineligible under the definition as properly iterated above as being anything like a Black Swan Event.
aka Exogenous Shock to the System
By definition, a known politician could well qualify for the Anti-Christ, but not a Black Swan.
Population growth is self-correcting. Problem solved.
The rate of growth has been declining for over thirty years, even though total population has been increasing. (a first differential equation with no saddle points for our quants).
Eventually, population growth will be in decline, as the third world becomes more enamored with their iPad27, than turning the old girl over one more time.
My only hope is that Black Swan(s) are edible.
Swans are mean animals.
I would not get close enough to one to kill it.
It would probably kill me first.
And watch-out what you say about Harold Camping. He is a neighbor of mine.
He bought a bunch of adtime around his last date (here in SF).
I thought that yelling 'Fire' in a crowded movie theater was illegal. I guess it is not anymore.
'the end is nigh'
The Other Dave in SF
Swans are mean birds, true. But a swan is not a wolverine, let alone a grizzly bear. If you're not ready to face a swan, you're not ready for Fight Club.
A turkey gun makes very short work of a swan.
Since when do the whiners get to call ZH a crowdwed theater?
Fire!...run for your lives!!!
Actually Tyler and Kayman, in addition to declining population growth rates in some countries...
The most critical black swans that kill and disrupt societies are foretold in Revelations (the 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse) and have repeated and will naturally repeat due to the wave-like cycles in the struggles between humans vs. humans (wars); nature's cycle of plenty and want; and humans vs. disease (pandemics).
There are 3 black swan events that occur time and again when populations rise too much, a) causing overcrowding and poor hygiene, exacerbating communicable diseases; b) making them highly susceptible to the exteme cycles of nature and; and c) creating conflicts when rising nation-states compete in real-politic for scarce resources.
1) is the Red Horse; Major Wars. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_and_anthropogenic_disasters_by_death_toll
WW I killed ~40 +M people. WWII killed ~60+ M people. WWIII ==> would probably approach 100+M people. And the Holocaust killed 12+M people.
2) is the Black Horse; Major Famines. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_natural_disasters_by_death_toll
Two Chinese famines killed 40+M in 1958-61 & 24+ M in 1907. The Indian famine in 1900 killed 19M people. The Great European Famine in 1315 killed 7.5M people. The Soviet imposed Holodomor famine killed 9-10 M people in 1932
3) is the Pale Horse; Massive Pandemics. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_epidemics
The Roman Antonine Plague killed 5 M people. The Black Plague killed 100 M people. 1918 Influenza killed 75 M and AIDS has killed 25M so far.
4) is actually the 1st horse and is to be the Anti-Christ. Hopefully I'll be dead before he arrives since he will probably cause more death and sufferings on top of the other 3 Horsemen. (Some scholars predict that the Anti-Christ will come from a specific region of the world, the Middle East. He would likely be either Jewish, Muslim, or Christian).
Lastly, keep in mind that if any of these Horsemen were to occur simultaneously, their synergistic destruction of society and our ability to harvest and produce would be even more massive. Major wars would kill and disrupt farmers and manufacturers. The depletion of services would hamper Public Health care in the event of a pandemic, and the fallout from even a limited tactical nuclear war would devastate nature's hospitatlity creating uninhabitable lands and untillable soil.
the plan is to kill about 6 billion.
THE New World Order: GEORGIA GUIDESTONESUmmm, a credible estimate of peak human population prior to the exploitation of fossil fuels is 500 million. Once the fossil fuels are largely depleted (almost cetainly this century), there is no good reason to believe the human population will not revert to that level. Actually, due to desertification and topsoil erosion due to plowing, the supportable number will probably be substantially lower.
I know that it is comforting to believe that there is some grand conspiracy to reduce human population that extremely - it implies that at least *someone* is in control. But the hard-to-face truth of the matter is that there is no conspiracy of humans, evil or otherwise, in control of our destiny. H. sapiens was selected to "consume it now!" due to the difficulty in storing food in primitive circumstances, and to compete ruthlessly with others for the most desireable mates.
Yah, it's not pretty, but denial isn't going to make it better.
" (Some scholars predict that the Anti-Christ will come from a specific region of the world, the Middle East. He would likely be either Jewish, Muslim, or Christian)."
Glad the Budhists were ruled out...
Glad you narrowed it down for us....
Doc Occ
The more I hear someone invoke the big, angry guy in the sky, the more I am convinced we aren't that far from swinging from vines.
Well, I can agree that some unknown virus or bacteria could cause exponentional havoc, I am certain the Anti-Christ is Fractional Reserve Banking and its spawn, the Central Bank.
Even if population is not growing anymore, economy can't survive without growth. Or have you ever heard that a renowned economist, business leader or politician is promoting zero growth or economic decline?
In result Africans will have their second home with AC/pool, three cars and five TVs in the end.
Even a moderate economic growth rate of only 3% per year (China has 8% and no population growth) will fuck up the planet within 200 years.
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-QA2rkpBSY
The economy can survive without growth. Bankers can't survive without growth.
Or the one "Black Flag" event that changes the course of history.
Re: Imperial warfare killed far, far more than any famine or resource crisis in the 20th Century.
I call bewelsheet. 30% die of cancer now. Manchester U studied hundreds of mummies: no cancer.
Fukushima is the black swan. When they incinerate the 500,000,00 kilos of radioactive debris at 100,000 bq/kg. (Until 2014) it will be like a Fukushima going off every day from now to until 2014. Neither humans nor the environment can survive in good health. Can you say all deaths from cancer, leukemia (strontium) and heart attack (cesium)? Pacific ocean dead, most life forms mutated with multigenerational chromosone defects. A good defect and you may survive if you don't have many bad defects. But most family lines will dieoff.
My family line goes back to Eve. Can't trace much of it though.
And what happens when the Black Swan eats the Red herring, falls onto a pig in a poke, and then crashes into the cat in the cradle? Dog it out? Be stubborn like a mule? Ape the Bernank? Pigeon-hole your funds? Stick your head in the sand like the ostrich? That's the elephant in the room if you ask me. And, provided you don't have bats in the belfry, you should move at something other than a snail's pace to get yourself a hair of the dog and do a swan dive into PMs before you become a lame duck.
Yeah, but keeping your PM's secret is the 800-lb gorilla in the room.
For get the black swans and red herrings, it's the dead ducks we should be worried about.
A surprise event?
I understood black swans to be RARE events that were just assumed to be so rare, you could bet your life against them.
It's from the idea of a rare birth of a black swan.
It's not a surprise event, like Japan bombing pearl harbor, but it's more of a surprise event like winning the lottery.
It stems from all the math wizards on Wall Street creating fun financial products that are based on extremely low risk events, then piling up the cash to bet against them happening.
Things like "Greece could never default" then selling CDS againt it. Or Bear Sterns would never collapse....and betting the entire financial industry on it.
I agree, black swan is used everywhere and I'm not sure why. I think people think of it as being an evil duck or something.
All the swans in Europe are white. AS they explored outwards, Asia, Africa, etc, all the swans were white. So they assumed that all swans are always white. Then they got to Australia, where the swans are black. A surprising event, possibly contrary to your assumptions.
'Black Swans'?... That's rayciss!
Only if they wear hoodies....
Swans of African Heritage
Egyptians?
African-Swannie-Americans.
How about a whole flock of 'Black Swans'...
FIRST WIND DENIED THE CONSTRUCTION OF BOWERS MOUNTAIN PROJECT!http://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blog/show?id=4401701%3ABlogPost%3A38001
[snip]
Facing an imminent denial, the applicant, through lead counsel Juliet Browne of Verrill Dana, filed a request several weeks later that they be allowed to withdraw the project application. After much deliberation, the LURC board tabled the request to withdraw, but did agree to give the applicant some additional time to reconfigure the project. Interveners in the case argued that the applicant was simply venue shopping. In the end, the LURC Commissioners awarded the applicant an additional 90 days to reconfigure the project in hope of mitigating the project’s scenic impact, while expressing serious reservations that it could be mitigated at all. The applicant assured the Commission that 90 days would be enough time and that they would bring back a formal outline of a reconfigured project by March 9th.
Twenty minutes prior to expiration of the deadline, the applicant submitted a letter stating that “[First Wind] is not able to present a particular reconfigured project to the Commission at this time.” The letter then repeated the earlier request that they be allowed to withdraw the Bowers application. At today’s meeting LURC voted to officially deny First Wind’s request to withdraw and directed its staff to resume preparation of the application denial document. The denial is now scheduled to become official by Commission vote on May 4, 2012.
Massachusetts Green Bubble Alert: First Wind
http://bjdurk.newsvine.com/_news/2012/04/01/10888055-massachusetts-green-bubble-alert-first-wind
[snip]
(UPC) First Wind President and CEO Paul Gaynor plays a significant and enviable role in the crafting of MA renewable energy mandates as a Boston-based wind developer who is the Deval Patrick Administration appointed Advisor on renewable energy policies.
It is alarming that Paul Gaynor was tapped to bring the "success" of UPC (First Wind) subsidiary Italian Vento Power Corporation IVPC to the United States,http://www.wpi.edu/News/Transformations/2005Summer/windpower.html,when seven IVPC wind projects
have since been seized by Italian police.
UPC First Wind subsidiary IVPC Director Oreste Vigorito was arrested for wind energy fraud.
In the words of Anti-Mob Prosecutor Roberto Scapinato, Fox News Report: ‘Mafia Invests in Sicilian Windfarms’ May 5, 2009
(excerpt): [Scarpinato]:
"This is the amazing thing -- that developers got public money to build wind farms that did not produce electricity," he said.
Furthermore, locally-built wind farms are often bought up by multinational energy firms from other parts of Europe, none of which know the true identities of the original owners.
"A handful of people control the wind sector," said Scarpinato. "Many companies exist, but it is the same people behind them." Eight arrests have already been made."
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Remember the broadband that this company was promoting just before their 'collapse'?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXabHVNQthw
See UPC Broadband.
More to come.
Fascinating. And Enron will make this all possible?
I'm still waiting for the day to come when a bill in the mail arrives advising me that I have to pay a tax on my suntan because some banking fuck had purchased the rights to UV rays which had only reached the orbit of Venus a short while ago when the rights were purchased...
Comparing empirical experiments based on fact to non-empirical ones based on belief - FAIL.
Just in case any of you were wondering how the "Limits to Growth" folks' predictions are doing:
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/Looking-Back-on-the-Limits-of-Growth.html
There are no limits to the growth in incorrect Malthusian projections.
You would be surprised by the "standard of living" people are willing to accept. Just one thing a tour of duty in Afghanistan did for me. Armchair quarterbacks have no fucking idea, but will get exactly what they deserve. Fine by me.
It ain't much (my thanks) but thank you Brother in law just returned and coming to visit in 2 weeks, we are stoked!
Thanks for your service LoP...Glad you made it home safe. I can't imagine the change of perception one would get from a tour in "the stone age" but it happy you made it all the way back stateside and into the zHedge.
Why do the comparisons stop in 2000, even though the article was written in 2012?
In the 1970-2000 period, the predictions are not all that different than extrapolations of pre-1970 trends.
Totally off topic, but did anyone else see silver spike to $33 last night at 11:00 on the Kitco chart? It's been erased now, but I'd swear on my life it was still on their chart at 5:00am EST.
Greetings Yen X.
Seems to be a wrong quote by Kitco. It's not visible on Bloomberg.
Even on Semmo tick by tick chart there was nothing to be found early this morning. How does a "wrong quote" happen?
I also saw it last night. Gold had the same instant spike for a split second.
I saw gold at $1690 on kitco too. Then erased
Must read for Chris Martenson and any other Malthusian.
They don't have to read it to ignore it.
Everyone's lives depend on the prediction of the future. Asking a mind not to try and predict the future is like trying to tell the soul to live without hope, or like telling your logical side to not make goals.
So I said, blue M&M, red M&M, they all wind up the same colour in the end
Plaid-swan bitchez! Make shirts...
Black swan right here....
http://youtu.be/vBzPsY3D58k
Kill game. Shake the spot. You ain't gotta lie to kick it. The FEDs fixin to cross that Red Sea. If the banksters can't get money out of us maybe they can get us to kill each other.
Black and White swans Bitchez.
Here in SF, all of the swans are Pink.
Pink Swans Bitchez!
The Other Dave in SF
I thought a black swan was a gay, negro ballet dancer ? Monedas 2012 Comedy's Cutting Edge
Negro? Your "cutting edge" dulled in 1975.
What happened in 1975 ? MLK and his hooker were shot ? Monedas 2012 Language is a living thing !
I'm guilty of using the rigor mortised corpse.... Oriental.
I use Viagra, too ! Nothing to be ashamed about ! Monedas 2012 Comedy Jihad Vigor Rigor Nigor
Over a million people died in the Irish potato famine, not long after Malthus wrote - and back then Ireland was part of Britain. The population of Ireland was 8 million before the famine, and it is still now in the 5 million range.
So how 'wrong' was Malthus about upcoming hunger in Britain? A few years off, and just one of the two main British Isles?
In fact, Malthus nailed it.
Now we have 2 billion people in the world hungry out of 7 billion, and people in Africa are still having babies like crazy.
A few decades back there was famine in Ethiopia, among 40 million people ... World aid poured, teaching better more efficient farming etc.
After a few years of 'aid' the population of Ethiopia has now doubled to 80 million ... and now there is famine again. The African population explosion is expected to lead to 10 billion people by mid-century.
If the oil does run out, the earth maybe can support half a billion comfortably.
Malthus was not 'wrong', a little early, and off geographically, but not 'wrong'.
In a population of 8 million in those days (when people didn't live as long) you are going to lose 300K by natural attrition ! How many migrated to 'Merica and how long did the famine last ? Monedas 2012 Let them eat fish and mutton and grain ! Myth Busters Inc. Was their a grass and cereal blight, too ?
Monedas
I believe corn was a dominant crop, but from Irish lands the English fed themselves first.
New world corn (unlikely)....or corn in the generic, cereal sense ? I thought the English ate Irish babies ? Monedas 2012 The IRA lurkers always gotta get their dig in against the English ! I guess this makes me an Irish Potato Famine denier ?
No, Monedas, you simply read the English version.
P.S. No need for the IRA, when your former Prime Minister, was hiding in plain sight.
That's not a Black Swan.
That's just plain olde fashioned Genocide.
Africa is now for the Chinese to exploit...
Let the ChiCOMS shed a tear about Haji starving in the ditch (while the cameraman is behind the lens eating a sandwich)...
Sam Kinison was right... Send 'en U-Hauls... Send 'em suitcases...
Some Countries no matter what u teach em they go back to the same ole ways. Stop the fucking aid and crap. As long as the funds flow no incentive to work or do anything.
Exactly, he correctly predicted famine in Ireland, and since then hunger is daily routine for the Irish, and starvation still the most likely cause of death as of today.
Yep, Malthus really nailed it.
malek
Pass Bank Guy a biscuit, I don't think he got what you said.
bank guy in Brussels
The Irish died because it was Colony of England and the English sent all the grain back to feed themselves.
Potatos were planted on all the poor growing lands because they generally were heartier. Potatos, a South American staple transplanted to Ireland.
"The African population explosion is expected to lead to 10 billion people by mid-century." And preceding this population explosion, I suppose Greece will clear up its overdue accounts ?
Introduce Africa to debt and internet porn and population will decline like a swarm of locusts eating a cornfield to its nubbings.
Malthus was wrong and so are you.
Crap. The potato blight came from the United States. The potato came from Virgina when Sir Walter Raleigh brought it back to England. The Irish died because they relied on one crop to feed a high birth rate. The British spent £20 million in 1846 importing grain. The Irish flooded into textile towns like Liverpool, Manchester, Glasgow and the Militias had to keep order.
KayMan is way off and should learn some history
The potato is a South American native.
"The Almighty sent the potato blight, but the English created the famine" Look up who controlled all the productive land in Ireland.
Get to the point....how many potatoes died ? Monedas 2012 All life is sacred !
Malthus sure didn't anticipate the discovery/use of oil. Of course, according to the logic of many here at ZH, if it hasn't happened, it never will. And that's not logical.
Now we have 2 billion people in the world hungry out of 7 billion, and people in Africa are still having babies like crazy.
_____________________________________________
Ah, the great US citizen principle: overconsumption is the result of lower level consumers. It has to be that way.
That is US citizen claims.
Now, the situation:
the rich own much more they can ever consume, therefore they are locked in a conservation situation.
The poor do not have access to the resources, goods and commodities and therefore improperly consume.
Who is doing the bulk of the consumption? Whose aggregate consumption is such that it put such a strain on world resources that depletion is rearing its head?
The US citizen middle class.
That is one little observation this US citizen would prefer to ofuscate, wanting to shift the responsibility of depletion on lower or even non consuming (as starving can be the result of not eating, nearly by definition, right?) people.
The technology advancement alone is not sufficient to explain the population boom.
The core factor is US citizen economics which is based on transfer of wealth.
In US citizen economics, the middle class does the bulk of the consumption. They do not want competition on their US citizen middle class consumption items so they do not want middle class to rise anywhere else.
What US citizen middle class needs is a larger and larger lower class whose demand is fixated on low end articles like food and health so that these populations are led to transfer more and more of their resources toward US citizen world.
Ethiopia with 40 million people but with a US citizen middle class type would consume more than 80 million lower class ethiopians and goods that are the hallmarks of US citizen middle class.
Sometimes, some US citizens betray themselves as they bemoan the possibility of the rise of a US citizen chinese middle class. Once again, 500 million chinese with a US citizen middle class among them will tremendously more consume than the current China.
The number of half billion people to live comfortably after peak oil is totally preposterous. 500 million US citizens wont never live comfortably after peak oil.
One billion of them (or even less) was enough to push the world into the current situation.
Now, why such a basic mistake when it comes to overconsumption, ending with the conclusion that non consumers are the cause of depletion of resources?
A possibility is the following: US citizens have the passion of the group.
US citizens are well known to have used their demographics power to overcome other societies.
There is that Indian chief whose name evades me at the moment (a shame as this man deserves to be distinguished as he helped to characterize US citizenism) who explained in his own times the flow of US citizen onto the land of his people.
US citizen societies have reached peak theft, they can no longer rob as they used to because they have robbed the most of it. They can no longer glorify theft as they used to. Because US citizens own or control most of it.
That would be legalizing theft onto themselves.
The end situation is funny: while US citizens poured into areas with low density of people, we've got the present situation.
No one could make up such story. No one but US citizens.
AnAnonymous said:
The consumption of opium by Chinese citizenism sitizens is tremendous and continues blobbing up to the stars and beyond.
Be ambitious, switch to Chinese citizenism and you too can have in your neighborhood a Peoples Liberation Opium Parlor. Blob up now and you too can get stoned an invade Nepal for much success.
No need for self indiction when you can visit Peoples Liberation Opium Parlor. Rewrite your own history on a daily basis.
But hey, why not? It is self justifying.
Glad you can visit your own fantasy.
Yeah, let the ASEANs have the helm for a while.....and we can be their worst North Korean style, wacko nightmare ! Monedas 2012 It's our turn to be the terrorists !
How about a Black Mamba for The Bernake
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsaG8rJGlyQ
Wrongo - a black swan is the cluster of all fucks. Coming soon to a world near you.
what you're saying is a linear based black swan event fails (the null of a null?) when practical considerations alter the outcome; such as greater efficiencies, and population control. black swan events can be prevented with new (economic) policies. the problem is the Fed is using an opened ended monetary policy which assumes practical considerations will never alter their ability to throw money on the problem. and of course when the debt is unmanageable by conventional methods, any shock to the system, and its political and policy making limits. the Fed is betting that the debt limit will always be raised. (or by analogy betting against the house that they can double down each time, and the house will never place a limit on their bet)
and this is bizarre part, the Fed is no longer running the casino, they are on the other side and we (the taxpayers) are dealing the cards, and they get yelling NO LIMIT. but its obviously OUR casino. sooner or later we throw the sore losers out.
I dismiss this article as just more techno-conucopianism. Despite the academic theories of economists of all stripes, there ARE fundamental physical limits to the growth of high-technology society, as the plateauing of oil production is proving today, and as the likely increasing prices and availability of such non-renewable resources as silver, arable topsoil and rare earth metals will prove in the near future, if they are not already doing so today.
For those who flippantly disregard the physical limits to growth, just go ask the Classical Maya or the moai-raising Easter Islanders. Oh wait, you can't --- their civilizations collapsed due to resource depletion. Are we so very different from them?
Easter Island Citezenisms were the most horrific offenders. At least they had no means of exporting their style of citizenism to the rest of the world.
It was no coincidence that the moai of Easter Island had such long noses --- merely a reflection of the inherent and eternal nature of nose-picking Easter Island citizenism, which due to some incomprehensible and paradoxical temporal mobius-strip which only Chinese dishwasher citizenism citizens can explain, was both the cause AND the product of supposed US citizenism.
I eagerly await our dishwasher's explanation of how "US citizenism" was responsible for not only the fall of Rome, but for the decline and disappearance of the Norse Greenlanders, the collapse of the Khmer civilization, and the extinction of the dinosaurs.
Archeological evidence supports the assumption that there were no roads on Easter Island. Ergo, no place for easter Citizenisms to relieve themselves. The true cause of the extinction was severe constipation.
No shit!
.
Riterarry.
ROR!
"The true cause of the extinction was severe constipation."
Yes, the Usinias Blobititus bacteria...thats what I understand as well.
And let's not forget limits of water availability. That is most likely the ultimate limiting component to the survivability of homo sapiens in the billions with which we have become temporarily accustomed.
GLTA
Have any stats on how much fresh water is left on planet Earth? Everyone is just drinking the shit up like it's water and pissing it away, LITERALLY!
Lake Superior, Baby!
Just drop in your straw & SUCK!
There is virtually unlimited amounts of fresh water in the ocean. Between a depth of 1000 meters and a minimum distance above the sea floor, depending on how warm the crust is there, lies all the fresh water you could desire, with no oxygen or salt in it.
You stick a tube into it, and it shoots to the surface like an artesian spring. The immense pressures at that depth squeeze the oxygen, salt, and pretty much everything else out. the water is at 4 centigrade, its densist point. Unless you manage to lower the level of the oceans, you can keep pulling water out and it gets replenished virtually instantly.
Since the water shoots up on its own, it can be delivered without the need for pumps. it may also be possible to generate electricity using some of the pressure. The cold water can also be used to shock plants; by alternating between ice cold and warm water, plants can be tricked into accelerated growth.
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.06/craven.html
Thanks. Interesting article Matt, but you're a little off on the process. From the article:
Desalination:
Cold seawater passes through Craven's "skytowers," which contain closely packed radiator-like networks of pipes. The frigid pipes sweat in the tropical heat, producing freshwater condensate.
Thanks, I missed that. I had a heck of a time finding anything on this guy, since I couldn't remember his name. Does the air have to be humid to work, or only hot? If only hot, perhaps this could be used in places like Libya that have deep pockets of water just off shore.
Anyways, I started looking up stuff under his name and under Common Heritage Corporation. Here's an interesting article he wrote on our energy future and some proposed solutions:
http://www.oceancommission.gov/meetings/may13_14_02/craven_testimony.pdf
And just think about how many civilizations collapsed long time ago, and we don't even know about them!
But why do we restrict on human groups? How many species have gone extinct on earth, compared to the number of still existent ones!
How many other planets had primitive forms of life developing on them, and then -Woosh!- wiped out again!
Yeah, so despite the fact that atomic elements can hardly be destroyed and we have a giant thermodynamic singularity pretty close to us, we will inevitably run out of resources and out of energy very soon.
How do we know that the peoples of the Easter Islands and the Mayans, etc., etc., the Niphlim, etc., etc., etc., disappeared due to resource depletion?
There is no history of their demise.
No records, books, tablets, scriptures, pictures, drawings, cartoons, pliths....
Nada, naught, none, nope.
Same as the classic calim of the construction of the pyraminds of Giza, central and south America.
Absolutely No Record.
I'm not contending you are wrong. Rather, history simply has no record.
That resource depletion was the cause is speculation. No different than the speculation that there is or is not, a God.
Leaving aside the fact that we wouldn't know they existed at all if they didn't leave any record, the Rapanui did have a writing system and left written records. So did the Maya, by the way. What the fuck did you think the so-called prophecy is all about--a new age creation? Clearly your comment is well researched/reasoned. You apparently think that because YOU would be speculating on these matters, others are too. . . and you confort youself thereby in your ignorance.
The archaeology of Easter Island has been quite thorough though the language has not be completely deciphered (not leaving records is different than us not being able to read them). Its quite a small island that was inhabited for only a short time so the archaeology is finely detailed and hard to misinterpret. The settlement of Easter Island was short. . .no sign of humans before 500 A.D. Most were dead by 1500. It went from completely forested to utterly tree-less in a few hundred years. I suppose it could be some type of climate change, but the coincidence would be a big one. Not surprisingly for a monumental culture on a dry island, they interred their dead--a practice which leaves tangible demographic evidence that their population dropped precipitously (so precipitously that some of the stone monuments were abandoned in mid-process in the mines) prior to Cook's expedition which "discovered" the island. Skeletons buried during the period of rapid population decline have knife marks from intentional defleshing. It could either be ritual pre-burial defleshing or cannibalism--at this point we can do some speculation if you want. I guess if you don't "believe in" carbon dating, stratigraphy, forensic science or the partial deciphering of their writing system, its speculation with absolutely no record just like whether or not there is a God.
All that said, just because their culture collapsed and declined because of resource depletion doesn't necessarily mean ours will--we are not them. It remains to be seen whether the things that make us different will actually make a difference, or what we have in common will lead us down the same path. Either way though, don't delude yourself; there is ample evidence that past civilizations have collapsed due to resource mismanagement. . .there is at least a possibility that ours will do the same.
How disappointing.
There are no fundamental limits to what technology can do. Men shooting arrows at squirrels 10,000 years ago might have thought it impossible to build a wall across a continent. A stonelayer 2000 years ago would have thought it was impossible to harness the power of lightening. A line worker in a factory from a hundred and fifty years ago might have thought that man would never fly, or walk upon the surface of the moon.
Oil is nothing but an energy dense energy storage mechanism, and a feedstock for chemical production. There are plenty of alternatives for those. Silver will be made obsolete by new carbon alotropes, metamaterials, and other advances for most if not all non-monetary applications. Topsoil can be manufactured. Rare earth minerals are NOT in short supply at the right prices.
Your examples of collapsed civilizations do not compute. If you asked the classical Maya why thier civilization collapsed, they would tell you it was because the priests killed everyone to bring the rains back, but the rains never came, so they shrugged. There were no depleted resources. Only agricultural failure and a loss of faith in their leaders. The Easter Islanders would be even more clear. They didn't use up their natural resources in some sort of growth spurt. Their population wasn't growing. They used up their trees building monuments to their barbarian leaders. They didn't have private property, so no-one owned the trees. No-one could benefit economically from them. So they let the thugs have them. Same as the Romans. The Romans didn't run out of resources, their people allowed their government to grow to the point where they consumed everything in the name of patriotism, to the point where they were GLAD when the barbarians marched in and drove the bastards out.
No, no civilization ever collapsed from resource depletion. They might have collapsed from government spending based on resource wealth which vanished after the resource was depleted, as various south Pacific Islands have. Even in those cases, it was the government which prevented the correct allocation of resources, focusing on popular redistribution and self glory rather than investment and education.
.
Really? Can technology (even theoretically) create a spaceship that can travel faster than the speed of light? Can technology create new continents with enough arable land to feed 100 billion people? Can technology create an element of atomic number 200? Of 500? Your statement is frankly almost surreal, and strikes me as something along the lines of the blind economic dogmatism of Julian Bond, in which the market will ALWAYS provide whatever is required, physics be damned. History teaches that sometimes it is otherwise.
Tmosely, I find this rambling diatribe to be what does not compute, as well as displaying a simplistic, naive and near-religious faith in technology that is utterly unwarranted. Yes, both the classical Maya and the Easter Islanders DID deplete resources: the former the fertility of their arable land, as well as in many cases the topsoil itself, and the latter completely exterminated virtually every species of tree on their island, negatively affecting their local climate and rainfall, and dooming themselves to societal and environmental collapse ---- a collapse, incidentally, which even modern technology is unable to reverse.
I agree that it is childish to focus on given resources, such as whale oil, coal or copper, and say that their diminishment or loss is automatically going to doom modern technological civilization. It is equally glib and erroneous, however, to assume that there are NO limits to growth whatsoever --- that kind of blind hubris, to be honest, scares the shit out of me.
Can technology do that which we currently think is impossible? Of course! Technology has allowed us to do the impossible for hundreds of years! Who knows what will become possible with future accumulation of capital and technology!?
Who the fuck are you? You aren't the akak I knew. Has your account been hacked? Your writing style has suddenly changed dramatically. You sound more like trav or some other death worshipping dipshit than yourself with the posts you have made in this thread. They seem totally out of character for you.
First off, you don't know SHIT about what happened with the Maya. NO-ONE DOES! There are only theories. We do know what happened with the Easter Islanders, because Westerners encountered them just a generation after their collapse. They didn't expend all of their trees building productive capital, they expended them moving stones. The ancient equivilant of the Keynesian digging and filling in ditches. Comparison between that and the free market is asinine, and I think you know that (if you really are akak).
You say it is "glib" to assume there are no limits. Why should we assume there are limits when we have yet to encounter any!? Recognition of facts is not hubris. Maybe if we encounter some aparently fundamental limitation that stands for a thousand years we can say that it is unlikely that we will ever overcome it, but to say that NOW is idiotic, and will certainly sound stupid in a generation, like those who said the sound barrier would never be breached, or those who said that men wouldn't be able to survive movement faster than 40 mph (seriously, people used to think this!).
Amen.
I don't post often but am familiar with akaks post; I was noticing a change in his writing just before I scrolled down to see your response.
Well, he has to face the reality of US citizenism and that can take its toll on people.
really?
i'm getting same old shithead ak; i think i understand what he's trying to say to tMo, too, but the obliteration of it is so devastating, i'll just leave it to others to decide for themselves
speaking for myself, it seems possible to say the we haven't progressed at all in our understanding of ourselves
plus, TV alone probably sets us back about 4 millenia
hi, ak!
Tmosley, I agree with you that technology has often led to developments that were previously considered impossible or even unimagined --- that is not in question, nor disputed. What I take issue with is the hubristic and naive assumption that technology can and will always solve ALL human problems --- or the denial of the fact that, just sometimes, technology actually leads to problems.
And I find it both humorous and offensive that you now assume that I am not the same person who has been posting here for the past 2+ years merely because this time I happen to disagree with you. In fact, for as much as I have stood with you and defended you in the past, particularly in exchanges with that vile Trav7777, I disagreed with you on this subject just as much in the past as now, but held my tongue due to not wanting to appear to agree with the loathesome, racist, bully who was Trav.
So I am not the person who I have been consistently here merely because I do not fall into the right-wing, Dominionist, ecological know-nothingism of so many who comment on ZH? You may make that assumption if you wish, but you would still be wrong. The fact that one can acknowledge the scientific facts that yes, ecology IS a science, and that mankind DOES have negative impacts on the environment, and that environmental degradation and ecological devastation HAVE led to societal collapses numerous times in the past, does not make one in any way less pure a libertarian, or less of a supporter of the free market. But that does NOT mean that I make a religion out of my free market principles, and am willing to blindly deny aspects of societal failure that cannot be addressed by free market activity --- the market, like the people who make it up, is not always rational or perfect.
And I am disheartened and appalled by your ignorant denial of the vast amount of archeological evidence which points precisely to what caused the downfall of the classical Maya, and the Norse Greenlanders, and the Easter Islanders --- in each case, it was environmental degradation, pure and simple. The evidence is apparent and unambiguous on many levels: for the classical Maya, for example, it ranges from increased soil ash content due to increased burning of forests for crop cultivation, to radically increased riverine sedimentation due to soil erosion, to the decrease in tree pollen and simultaneous increase in corn and weed pollen in lake sediments, to the massive growth of homesites in areas previously unoccupied due to marginal agricultural potential, to the evidence of increasing malnutrition and periods of starvation evidenced by human bone irregularities in the late classical Maya period. Really, are you going to deny ALL of this evidence (of which you are clearly unaware) as just the ravings of eco-statists?
There were multiple aspects of that environmental destruction in each case that led to those societies' collapses ---- deforestation, diminished rainfall and increased ground-level wind negatively impacting crop cultivation in the case of the Easter Islanders; loss of soil fertility and loss of topsoil itself on slopes in the case of the Maya; loss of topsoil again in the case of the Norse Greenlanders due to overgrazing of sheep and cows, combined with a cooling climate --- but the multiple and multiply-reinforcing pieces of evidence which point to human-induced environmental decay in each case is beyond dispute, and can only be denied by the same sort of willfully and arrogantly ignorant know-nothings who similarly deny biological evolution because they believe it violates the teachings of their particular sacred book.
You say that "we" have never encountered any limits? I am sorry, but that just proves the depth of your historical and environmental ignorance on this subject. I have just given you three good examples above, and there are many more that can be given as well, of societies which faced, and fell to, real (and fatal) physical limits to their growth. We today are only different from those past societies in degree, not in kind, and while we may not fact limits in energy (peak oil), it is naive to think that we will always overcome EVERY other potential or actual physical limit; we only need to run up against one of them to bring our whole way of life grinding to a halt. I am not saying that it WILL happen, only that it could, and that the odds of that happening are far from minute.
Really, tmosley, I am disappointed in you here --- I thought you were better than this. To acknowledge environmental and physical reality is in NO way to presume that one cannot also be a staunch and principled defender of liberty, or to assume that one is in any way in sympathy with, or allied with, those statists who might capitalize on those environmental and physical facts to further their own individual political agendas. It is irrational to deny evidence, facts and reality itself simply because they happen to appear to bolster the statist arguments of others.
There are much better examples than the Easter Island.
The Islanders hit the bottom before they met US citizens and they were picking up. Contact with US citizenism is what destroyed faster than their own ways.
Over the course of the last two centuries, many human societies were destroyed. A number of them can only be inscribed to resources depletion by US citizens.
Whatsoever, Easter Islanders did that on their tiny island while the resources depletion brought in by US citizens is global in scale.
AnAnonymous said:
Made me laugh. Tell us now that Ben Franklin invented time traveling flying rickshaw for George Washington to go back in time to sink the Easter Islanders before 1776, July, 4th?
How much opium smoke inhalation is required for your imaginations to be so fantastical?
Yeah, sure. That is the path to follow steadfastly to glorify Chinese citizenism, to justify blobbing up of PR of C on the behalf of humanity, to hide behind the group of Chinese citizenism in order to dilute their responsibility.
That is what Chinese citizenism citizens do. Facts are only facts when they are acknowledged by Chinese citizenism citizens.
Club of Rome next meeting in Canada summary : Anybody willing to pay 550$ for the right to speak and/or listen is a dumbfuck sucker that (statistically) got no physical silver.
"Providing humanitarian assistance to (Taliban)" : Dumbfuck project implying free healthcare for them, and fuck all for Canadians. What about that, suckers?
Breaking Quebec (Canada) news : Waiting time to see a specialist to get a machine to help you breathe is now one year and a half. You will not get it right away though; the monkey will tell you which machine you will get. Cuzz, ya know, there are 3 types...
Let China have Africa and all the shit that goes with it ! Monedas 2012 The Muslims and the Chicoms can take that headache off our hands ! I don't ever want to see another stupid CNN program about famine in Africa !
Actually, if China takes over Africa (it wont happen as this would allow China to kickstart its US citizen middle class and deprive US citizen world from the control of many resources essential to keep US citizen into jobs), you'll get more reports about the disasters happening in Africa as the free press will do its job: exposing the shortcomings of others (even though Chinese will have asserted nothing as US citizens have) while covering for the disasters provoked by US citizenism.
CNN reports on Mali situation must not have gone round the clock for the last three weeks. Yet...
AnAnonymous said:
Clever subterfuge. But hey, no need to mention Tibet, Mongolia, or Nepal.
Chinese citizenism blobbing up is for Humanity to benefit.
At least until the opium intoxication wears off...
Nothing amazes me. Coming to think of it, able networks are full of shit leading the sheeples ot the slughter houses and the sheeples are in trance.
Ha Ha, the writer has clearly never been to China, or if he has never outside of Shanghai and Hong Kong....... I have spent alot of time in China, and I can tell you with certainty, nothing to fear there.... One of the side benefits of the Western printing, is to squeeze the Chinese till they pop. They can't devalue the Yuan or inflation will eat them alive game over, they cant leave the Yuan where it is or their manufacturing jobs will leave to Malaysia Indonesia and Vietnam, at an even faster rate. Right now they are loosing jobs by the thousands a month. The price of oil has screwed their balance of trade, when oil hits 150 to 200 their surplus trade balance will all be gone in 5-10 years. They have no middle class to buy their own goods.......... QED they are screwed. The US will simply change the name of the T bills from Fuk Yu to Mohammad Iwannakillya. Just like they used to push gold around the vaults at the turn of the century, without ever moving it.
There was an editorial today on Bloomberg 2.3 billion people dont have a sanitary toliet, a couple hundred, million or so of them live in China, a long way from Ipads. China served to replace the evil Muzzies as a unifying enemy, they will do so for a little while longer..... thats all they are being used for.....
Quite harsh. That would mean that actually Ben Bernanke is toying with inflation on a world scale to protect US citizen middle class's best interests.
Come on, it is well known that the big bad US citizen government would never do such a thing and that their failures do not come from lack of trying but from impossibility to deliver as the conditions that allows US citizen middle class type to thrive or even to exist are fading away.
As to the 2.3 billion people who do not have sanitory toilet, they have to be put first on the list of people who put such a strain on Earth that depletion is looming.
That by US citizen logics.
Non consumers are the root of an overconsumption problem.
AnAnonymous said:
Ah, humanity. Chinese citizenism citizens hijacking human beings.
But hey, resources when handled by Chinese citizenism citizens, is handled the Chinese citizenism way. Because Chinese citizenism citizen nature is eternal.
OK
I've read the comments. Now, where do we stand on stacking at this juncture?
Stack it to the moon!
Stack until the boat sinks...then start again...
A favourite phrase of mine by Dr. Albert Bartlett in reference to a peak oil calculation in the late 1800's: "One calculation was wrong, therefore all calculations are wrong."
LMAO
Sweet Post!
My favorite quote from Dr. Albert Bartlett:
"Can you think of any problem in any area of human endeavor on any scale, from microscopic to global, whose long-term solution is in any demonstrable way aided, assisted, or advanced by further increases in population, locally, nationally, or globally?"
My quote,
We need growth to pay the interest on the debt.